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A home only a skateboarder could love

Five-time world skateboarding champion Pierre Andre Senizergues has designed a house with no sharp angles or corners, and where every surface is made to ensure a smooth ride.

Skateboarding champion Pierre Andre Senizergues in a prototype of a house whose every surface is made for skateboarding. The structure is on display through the summer at Paris museum La Gaite. (Supplied photo)

By Elizabeth HaggartyToronto Star

Thu., July 28, 2011

Pierre Andre Senizergues loves his skateboard. He’s been glued to it since he was a teen, ridden it to five skateboarding world championships, and built the skateboarding shoe line etnies around it.

So it’s understandable that Senizergues would be slightly annoyed when forced to hop off his board as soon as he rolled up to his home’s front door.

“I began imagining a city of the future where skateboards are used as the primary form of transportation and recreation — in and out of your home.” Senizergues wrote to the Toronto Star in an email. “A utopia city for skateboarders would mean that a skateable path, like a ribbon connecting everything together, links each building in an unending ability to keep in motion on your board.”

In the early 2000s, Senizergues’ dream became a drive for reality when the pro teamed up with his friend, etnies designer and fellow skateboarder Gil Le Bon Delapointe, to build an entirely skateable house in a Malibu canyon Senizergues owns.

But after 10 years and numerous run-ins with the state’s Coastal Commission, the ground still hadn’t been broken on the project.

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That’s when Paris museum La Gaite stepped in. It offered Senizergues the opportunity to build a prototype of his dream home for display in their skate-culture exhibition running throughout the summer.

“Finally, when we heard about the La Gaite opportunity, I decided that it was time to bring a smaller version of the bigger concept to life to help inspire people on how skateboarding can influence the future of how we live,” Senizergues wrote to the Star.

Enlisting the help of skateboarding architect Francios Perrin, the team designed a skateboard-friendly living room along with ride-enabling furniture — naming it the PAS house.

“We started first from the perspective of skateboarding and we then built into the principles of living, not the other way around. The result is a unique 100% skateable environment,” Senizergues told the Star.

The prototype has no sharp angles or corners where the walls meet the floor. The surfaces are made of birch and poplar wood with minimal protective finish to ensure a smooth ride. All of the ledges are metal rails for grinding (sliding along an edge using the metal axle between your skateboard’s wheels).

“The prototype that is on display at La Gaite has built-in cabinets with working appliances and a lounge bench that acts as a couch, both of which provide perfect ledges for skating. In addition, we have the Skate Study House furniture on display for the living room and dining room,” Senizergues told the Star.

Picture a bench that you can glide along before launching your board into the air from the edge of your kitchen countertop, complete with functioning sink.

“As a skateboarder, we look at all of our environments differently. When one sees a street curb, we see a place to grind. We look at obstacles in our everyday life as challenges to conquer with our board, and so bringing perfectly constructed elements into a living space will only make every day life more epic!” Senizergues wrote.

Between 700 and 1,000 people have visited the prototype since it went on display at the beginning of the summer.

Senizergues is still planning to build a full-scale version of the house in his Malibu canyon, but the completion date remains undetermined.

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